The subject of the most recent Graydancer’s Ropecast included a rant (which isn’t all that ranty, so if you are hoping for spittle-flying desk-pounding histrionics, you’ll be sorely disappointed. I kinda was hoping for some heavy breathing and shouting, but noooooo…)about the difficulty of teaching suspension bondage in the environment of a broad-spectrum BDSM event.

To paraphrase: the thrust of his rant seems to be that it is near to impossible to teach suspension well in the context of a short-form class. There are too many skills involved to really do the thing right. In a mid/advanced-level rope-specific setting, with several hours allocated, small classes and multiple instructors, he beleives a class on suspension would seem to be more feasible.

This is partially due to the fact that many, many people attending cons might be dabbling in playstyles with which they have little to no familiarity, and zero experience.

Gray pondered the core issue of someone who possessed no rope of their own and had never done any rope bondage deciding that they wanted to take a suspension class. The issue being, you know too little: why would you think you could do this at all? Seems kind of presumptuous to jump in to one of the most complex types of rope bondage there is on your first go, right?Continue reading »

If you were at the FUCKING AWESOME Shibaricon in Chicago this past weekend, you know how much WIN was contained therein.

I’ve been traveling bunches this past 6 months or so. More than ever before in conjunction with BDSM scene events. Much of the time, I spend an inordinate amount of time in my room watching Deadliest Catch marathons, or insanely mindblowingly shitty B-Movies and Twittering.

Not this time.

Not only had I worked up the ovaries to ask several people to play, I had an extra guest ticket to the event. Rather than moping about not having a date, I enlisted the help of a friend from Twitter to sort of be my ConBuddy and nudger. Someone there to poke me if I was hiding and who was tasked, if I needed it, to hide with me so I felt that much less lame.

And you know what? She may well have been my lucky charm because so much fell into place.

I hit the ground calmly, even though I missed the Presenters Welcoming speech, etc. My flight was taxiing when it began and goodness knows ORD is a HUGE place to navigate when you are in a hurry!

I had a lovely supper with Viviane, and took a stroll around the playspace, but went to ground early. Mostly because I was a but bummed I couldn’t work out any of the play-dates I was hoping to have into that first night, but also because I have someone who has caught my fancy and I was looking forward to chatting with him before it got too late.

I did manage to run into the several with whom I wanted to play, so we reconnected in that way.

This was a magic con for that. I literally ran into who I needed to see precisely when I needed to see them, over and over and over.

I even managed to have some of “Ah, there you are, I’ve been expecting you!” moments of connectivity with Old Friends I’d not yet met.

Very magical. I bonded with some women of intense power this weekend. and to them I give my deepest thanks for touching my heart.

My class wasn’t until the last day of the con, and early morning at that, so I was free and loose most of the weekend. I DID have the appearance in the Cabaret show on Saturday night, and that was a lot of fun!

Note to self: wearing my ST:TOS uniform is a guaranteed way to garner much fanboy and fangirl love. I mean, hey, who HASN’T fantasized about gang-roping Uhura?? Really.

So did she play? This is the question!

After a shitload of Cons, and the last scene I’ve had being at KinkFest in Portland…in 2008 (!!!!) I am proud to say I finally have broken the drought.

Big time.

The inimitable Lolita Wolf broke the seal, in more ways that one. I was able to chat with her earlier in the evening, finally find a place to play and yegodholyhell the woman knows her way around a butt.

And she didn’t even get mad when I …um…well…was rather copiously grateful for her attentions. Grateful enough to spread copiousness all over her crinoline and onto her boots.

This was followed up by a really, really fun scene with Lqqout, who I managed to not only beat in a nipple-twisting contest, but also tagged in the grapes while I was in a partial suspension. Yay me!

Sunday was busy with classes, and more fun, as a friend I’d met at Beyond Leather and i got together for a very intense scene. Having never played with Deiter before, I was not at all certain what to expect but i think now I can expect a really wonderful intensity and awesome time. Oh and lost of delectable roughness.

Sunday evening wrapped up with a surprisingly cathartic scene with Gray, who managed to create space enough for me to lose myself to complete and upper break-down-sobbing-tears by the end of the scene…and I am fairly certain I was speaking in tongues there by the end.

Hey…its what I do.

I even got him to safeword later in the evening. Even the most famous tops bow before the mighty might of…The Chicken Dance.

My class was at the asscrack of dawn (Hey, 10:00 AM on the Monday closing day of a 4-Day con is BRUTAL, y’all!) but the attendance was great, the people in the class were SO present and supportive and the demo was truly inspired. Much love to Gray, Lqqout and Deiter for their ebilz…and extra love to Lqqout for being my truffle hero!

I am deeply grateful to each and every person who was there. You made it worthwhile to me.

If you DID attend my class, and you enjoyed it, and would like to have Shibaricon invite me back and sponsor more classes from the bottom / submissive POV, why not drop a note and let them know that? guests at Shibaricon dot com is the address :-)

Thankfully I bookended the trip with another night at the hotel. Managed to stave off some of the drop by decompressing with friends, relaxing, leaving at a leisurely pace. Most wonderfully I had the chance to spend time with some of the Shibaricon Staff and those are some badass fuckers right there, let me tell you.

My Aftercare Truffles for Tops were a big hit, by the way. If you are a bottom type person, consider treating the person who whips you into a sobbing puddle of ooze to a delectable after they take you down to subspace and leave you dangling over the edge, only to pull you back.

They’ll appreciate the thought :-)

And the nommables!

Even when they do mindfuck you into thinking they’ve eated you precious, precious White Chocolate Key Lime Pie truffles from See’s.

Yesterday afternoon I was walking through the lobby of the Beyond Leather host hotel here in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

Not long after teaching my second class of the day, I found myself in an intriguing exchange with a dashing salt-and-pepper haired gentleman of British extraction. He was holding my hand and pressing his lips to the back of my hand. He’d been gazing admiringly at me as I crossed the lobby, and when he’d initially spoken, I thought he was taking the piss. See, in the class I’d just been teaching I had mentioned I had a particular weakness for accents. I thought this might be a bit of a flirtatious gambit. That was fine actually. This was day 2 of Beyond Leather and I’d had many conversations in passing and some of the more silly ones had involved quite a bit of mental jockeying and word play.

This particular flirtatious ex-SAS Englishman and sadist had no of way of knowing he had scored a few points on my personal “WIN!” list. As he smiled at me, I was certainly intrigued. He asked if I was going to be playing that evening. I was, for the first time in 13 months of national Leather Events, able to say “Yes, in fact, I do have a play date about which I’m very excited!”

He mentioned that he, too, would be playing. And even offered the approximate time and location of the scene he would be conducting. For those not familiar with typical Kink Scene interactions, this is about as big a “flirt and flex flag” as a top or dominant can wave when in this situation.

See, I don’t know this dude from Adam. But inviting a bottom to watch you play demonstrates a modicum of confidence in displaying your skill, inviting them to check you out, so that they then have a common point of reference with regard to your play style.

And he seemed to be very interested in watching me play.

Kissing my hand again he lamented aloud “Ah, well…would that you were submissive!”

I sighed.

“Actually, I am.”

His gaze focused.

He smiled.

Yeah so.

Presumptuous?

Perhaps.

As my long time friend Bailey pointed out, this may well have been a “fish” for information. There are infinite ways of information gathering with a potential play-partner. By veering for this tack, he then had the opportunity to gauge my reaction to his question. The level of enthusiasm or dismissal can provide a great deal of information.

Though I was certainly at least interested in such an opportunity to observe, I don’t often commit to multiple scenes in one night. I tend to go pretty deeply in playing and need to have that focus.

But I gave him my card. He clarified his interest in learning more about me.

One never knows.

One might not know, but if you are me, you do often have “knowing.”

Oddly, I’d had a very strong feeling, a few days ago, that the playdate to which I was so looking forward wouldn’t materialize. But I had no real reason to think that I would miss out of that opportunity. I mean, this had been planned in advance, there were THREE days in which to have plenty of flexibility, somewhere in there a scene could be arranged at sometime, yes?

Yes.

Of course.

Or no.

I’m not of a mind to divulge my friend’s personal shit. I can say that, despite good intentions and despite my limited expectations, things derailed. And derailed badly.

A personal issue came up for my friend. He had to go deal with this in his own way. He understandably needed some space. I sent a series of text messages to check in as I was not at all sure what had happened. I did receive a bit of information from him which lead me to believe that yeah, something was uncool, but no emergency situation was unfolding.

Post demo rope marks.

I was disappointed but didn’t wanna be selfish. Gotta let go of expectations, yeah? And probably this would resolve later.

I also was not, to be honest, convinced that I would let a distant situation derail me from enjoying something I wanted. There is a lot that happens in life over which you have no control. But you do have control over your reaction to these troubles. I know for me, I loathe the idea that some fuckery deprives me of joy. Life is too short.

I caught up with Bailey. We chatted up some girl talk and caught up while I tried to not take any of this crap personally, to see if possibly this could be salvaged. I didn’t want to bug my erstwhile play-partner. He wasn’t in a great headspace, and needed personal time. And if, in fact, this situation was so vexing his headspace wasn’t in playing, well…so it goes. There was still Sunday…

I didn’t hear back after several messages and a voicemail. SO, I went to ground and just tried to relax. I really didn’t feel like going to the dungeon and watching all of these people enjoying, once more, everything I was, once again, denied.

Then my phone rang and I was advised by a mutual acquaintance that my date had come out of his funk and, it seems, was cheering himself up by scenening with someone who was not me.

Let me say I was not in a graceful place upon receiving this news. Walking in to the playspace and confronting the situation was, for ME, out of the question.

So I lay in bed sobbing and feeling like absolute shit.

Once again, I wasn’t enough, I was disposable, and I could be pushed aside in favor of someone else.

Regardless of whether or not this is true, this was how I felt.

Things were tangled and unhappy and only became more so after my distraught posts to Twitter were read by some people who were here at the event who, after offering me sympathetic support, conveyed to my anticipated play-partner that I was…not happy.

Interestingly, once he did contact me and came to my room (at my invitation) to talk, his affect was angry. Evidently my own expressions of upset were seen as an attack on his character.

I wasn’t in a good place to have my own disappointment and battered ego confronted with his backlash. So I took a series of deep breaths and let him explain his side of the story. It was convoluted. And I have zero reason to think it was a lie. But my feelings have a right to be respected. And he fell down in the chain of communication by not responding to me.

I had to do something I have an absolutely difficult time with, and that was to make clear I thought there had been a failure. On his part. On a very basic level.

I know that life intrudes. I know that slings and arrows and sticks and stones and all of these things can belay even the best laid plans.

And I believe also that how one handles stress and storms is even more important than how one lives in smooth situations.

We all make mistakes. And sometimes those mistakes wound and slice the emotions of others. And at that point the only thing you can do is to take responsibility for your actions and reactions to this stress.

As I have a promise made to myself many years ago not to sleep on anger, we talked through my feelings, my reaction, his view of the situation, etc.

I can say I am proud of myself for remaining grounded by my emotional truth. I did not cave in to my reflex to “Let it go.” I weighed what forgiveness I could give him and what was just too much. I let my compassionate nature soothe my nerves and to trust that I was making concessions in the right place and standing firm in others.

And in the morning I did receive the apology that I needed to have that piece of responsibility acknowledged.

Today is a new day.

In these Leather Event situations, when you are in high profile mode, you certainly don’t have time to be a mopey shithead when you are a presenter. And especially when you are me.

I had to publically interact with my friend, our very new truce in place. I will pat myself on the back again for handling that.

Though I certainly have no love for feeling like refried shit and having to suck it up and repair damaged friendships, I learned that I have the capacity to be strong and also to handle my shit with some dignity.

I also am proud that I held fast to my personal standards and not cave in to loneliness and desperation for play and pain and affection when it wasn’t offered on terms that I could accept.

I have compromised before.

I have felt what that is like.

I have let people have what they wanted of me and leave the rest.

I know what that feels like.

I am not enthralled with the sensation of standing firm and holding fast to my core values and still feeling alone and lost. But I have to do this.

If I settle again for crumbs, delicious and tempting as they are, I will be left alone. Again.

See, the thing about compromise for me is this: if the other person gets everything that they wanted and I get some of what I want, I will soon find myself with an emotional deficit I have no way to close.

But I held my shit together. I had friends call and write and offer their love.

And someone does want that, can handle, is worthy…and someone will care with the capacity and focus that matches my own.

So tonight I will lie low, I think. I am not of a mind to be used and played and then left behind. Sometimes that can be very sexy. Not so much tonight.

And I have been invited back to Beyond Leather 2010, which is, for me, quite an honor. I heard I received universal glowing reviews. I can stand alone there too. That is all me, absorbing, distilling, filtering and serving up my life, my essence, me.

Delicious Deviance: On Flying Your Freak Flag.

Perhaps you are a full blown pervert, but shy about exposing yourself online? Or maybe you are a fledgling kinkster, and unsure of how to remain true to your self while bridging the gap between fantasy and realty, taking the online to the flesh?

There are so many vectors and venues available, it can be tricky, and it can be daunting. But have no fear, you aren’t alone!

This discussion will cover the pros and cons of being out, of maintaining a kinky personae online, on the common pitfalls of finding yourself moving from one world to the other, and how one can maintain one’s humor while maintaining your integrity as a feminist and as a pervert.

Join Mollena Williams, BDSM Educator, kinky blogger, and Executive Pervert as she discusses and explores online kink and real-time perversions, and offers tips, suggestions and a few amusing cautionary tales to get your gears turning on how to maintain your humor and your integrity as an individual as you cross from pixels to playtime!

Sex. I mean, what else do ya bloody need to KNOW?!

I am stoked that my trip to NYC straddled the date for the SEX 2.0 Un-Conference. SO, I’ll be taking a Chinese Bus from NY down to DC…AGAIN…to talk to some people about being a pervert.

Because I love that shit!

And please, gimmie a shout out if you are attending. It looks like it is going to be the shizz.

Trusting others enables us to do truly miraculous things, like make pain transcendent and find new ways to access our souls.

In addition to this past weekend being my second anniversary of being sober (whee!) I was in Chicago to talk about a play-style that many people consider to be pretty edgy, and one I am always walking into with part of my heart quailing apprehensively and shaking with fear.

But now in the fluorescent safety of the Monday morning workday, I think I feel safe in saying: “WIN.”

I’ve done the “Race Play” class a few times now, and even though I am nervous to sickness each and every fucking time I do it, the overwhelmingly positive feedback helps me to see this IS a valuable class for folks.

The GD2 crowd was comprised on a lot of new kinksters, as their outreach mission includes free (!!!!!!) classes with national presenters and so the place brings in people from all over to teach and present.

It was a FULL house, which was awesome. They said it was one of the more well-attended classes they’d hosted.

I initially wasn’t going to do a demo, but it seems the universe has smiled on me of late in that arena. Seems like my Homeboy, Ganesha, has been fucking up many, many obstacles on my behalf…even the ones I put in my own way.

Last I did the Race Play class, Minax was with me in the mix for The Exiles edition, and to all reports she survived it ;-)

Since I was gonna be traveling I wasn’t planning on doing a demo in Chicago but a new “Con-Acquaintance” friend of mine mentioned he was gonna be coming in to town for my GD2 class and would be happy to help if such help was needed.

OK, well…um…sure.

[More like“OMFG are you kidding??? HELLZ YEAH!!” but we wouldn’t want to overfeed his ego, would we?]

Though I haven’t spent much time with Graydancer, I thought him cool and I had one of those gut level things happen.

Non-crunchy people, avert your eyes…

You know you meet someone and just feel “OK, yeah, this is one of the Soul Family People, and it is great to have you come around again!” This was one of those. I meet hundreds of people a year and have feelings like that, of immediacy and comfort and such VERY rarely. I try to trust that feeling. It hasn’t yet been wrong.

OK, non-crunchy types, you can pick up here again.

So I said “OK, why not!

Mind, I’d only seen him do ropework, and hadn’t played with him before.

But for several reasons, I felt absolutely fine about saying yes.

I scraped together the gumption to send him some of the extra-flowery un-PC bodice ripping period pr0n I’d started writing for The Limey Who Shall Not Be Named back in the day.

Of course I was then all “Shit…he’s gonna hate it and be all “Ugh what is this corny ass shit?!” and then not want anything to do with me at all.”

But that didn’t happen either, so that was a relief.

The class went really really well.

It was one of those deals where I felt very much in touch with the people there, even the ones who were somewhat guarded. And even though the room was hot as FUCK and I was sweating with nerves and not at all sure what was going to happen, I took a deep breath and forged ahead.

If the class was good, the demo was fucking AWESOME.

Well, for me, anyway.

Seriously.

I’d had little clue that I was dealing with someone who was highly adept in role-playing but duh, shoulda known. He is a performer and an instructor, so there is gonna be that advantage.

Plus, he’d totallycheated and was sporting my very favourite style of boots. And he was wearing black leather gloves.

Evidently, this also…uh…works for me.

Who knew?

I honestly couldn’t even LOOK at his feet too long. I’d forgotten about my thing with the boots…how does one forget that objects can become so deeply imbued with their own life that the right person at the right place in the right time can bring that all back again…?

How is it I keep forgetting that I actually really am a pervert?

Gray managed to somehow pull together a scene from the story I’d written and make it work in the context of this demo.

This is revelatory for me on several levels.

I’m still running through this so please, bear with me, I’m kind of scattered in my thinking. But the writing helps me get it out and hell, while I’m pulling apart this humming burning ball of energy, you might as well peek in :-)

I think it was really remarkable to be able to voice this very simple type of fantasy, not worry that other people would find it either “grindingly offensive ” or, worse yet, “too pedestrian and boring.” Let me say this (I know, kind of surprising) but I’d never even DONE a “Old School master / slave plantation thing” because, well, I know it is the obvious fucking thing to do and I have steered clear of it.

But I figure hey, I might as well have one of my fantasies addressed, yes?

And I am glad I did.

Um, so, the scene.

It was fantastic.

I’d inaccurately calibrated this man’s capacity for cold-bloodedness, so it was a bit of a genuine shock that he was SUCH a BASTARD!

Fucking awesome.

SO, yeah.

I think it is pretty much all I have to say about that right now. I might do a straight-up scene report one of these days, we’ll see how generous I’m feeling about that memory.

Yes, we did play later in the evening, and that was also rather phenomenal.

It is wondrous to me that, no matter how many years I do this, there is always something new that will sneak up on you and fuck your shit up so flawlessly, you can’t do anything except ride it.

I also newly re-discovered was something that I’d already had, but suffered the fate of being squashed down and buried for the past few years.

When I am single and feeling lonely MY default of late has been to walk away from those feelings of longing and let them do their own thing. I don’t want to try to suppress them, not anymore. But I do not want to dwell on what I do not have, because that sets me up in a poor place.

But for lots of reasons Gray was able to get in…just enough…to a few unused places and that lead me back to a simple sweet truth: I love “This.”

All the pain and beatings and bondage and all of that was compressed to one moment where I was prostrated with my cheek and lips against the warm instep of one of his boots, the other boot firmly on the back of my neck and his hand in my hair.

There was an absolutely clear moment of connectedness with the memory of the very first time I’d been in a place like that, almost eleven years ago.

And …sorry crunchy people, but it was one of those sacred moments where you get a revelation. it was this: despite all that had happened, that has happened to me in those years, all of the people that have come and gone, all that I thought I would have and all that I never expected, there IS a place where I can feel safe and even if it doesn’t look like anyone else’s safe space and even if it is just for RIGHT NOW, that is all any of us EVER have.

This moment.

So breathe it in.

It was SO. Huge.

I’m getting all crying and snuffly even as I try to write.

I have absolute faith in my ability to feel, to intuit, to trust when it is right to do so. And that is precious.

Um. Yeah.

Well, massive kudos to Gray, because he let me sob like a dork all over his boots for some amount of time. Dunno know long…you know how that goes.

And hands-down one of the most emotionally attentive people with whom I’ve had the honor to play.

Of course, the next morning, part of my brain is all “OMG OMG yeah, yeah, OK, I know, I know…you’re not poly and LDRs never work and you DO NOT do LDR shit with D/s for chrissake but OMG this may be your last chance to ever and we are scared to be alone again and blah blah blah blah.”

I was glad to feel that affection, and that openness to being submissive, and all those feelings. I didn’t criticise myself for having them, I tacked to the wind for the impact of sub-space and PMS**

And I enjoyed myself. It felt / feels great.

I’m not afraid. If anything, I am SO happy to have had that scene and those feelings because I haven’t had them in so long.

Rather than freaking out at the prospect of being alone, my thought this morning as I sort through e-mail and try to get to work is this:

These moments are a gift, precious precious precious and to try to shuffle my emotions to suit the external surroundings is hubris.

What is real emotionally is real emotionally.

Nothing less, and nothing more.

I CAN feel, even feel very profoundly, and enjoy that fully, and stand on my own feet afterward, and marvel at the magnificence of it.

I know that right now, I have to be present. By remaining present, I’ll be where I am supposed to be.

And this morning I love myself for that.

**Ladies: never, never EVER tell a sadist you are PMSing and that your boobs are sore. The likelihood that they will be compassionate and easier on them because of this is abysmally low. Just don’t mention it and hope for the best :-P

I have many words at my disposal…my odd propensity for occasionally reading dictionaries and my incessant hoovering of information blended with my never-ending quest for the most apt or surreal metaphors and similes rarely leaves me at a loss.

Yet this weekend I found myself at a loss several times.

I was in Chicago to teach the never-at-all-fucking-nerve-wracking class on Race Play, in front of a group comprised almost entirely of strangers.

I was doing the demo with a fellow educator for whom I’d had an oddly complete and instantaneous sense of absolute trustworthiness, yet with whom I’d never before played.

Oh, and just in case that wasn’t fucking insane enough, he’d not delved into this type of play himself.

Yeah, I’ll be fine…just take away that net.

And yes, It was fine.

Sheeit…let me not understate.

It was more than fine.

It was pretty bloody astounding.

And I’m not going to tell you about it just yet.

I’m sitting with my thoughts and my bruises and letting the memory and the sore spots linger all smoky slow like honey and remarkable in their soft-focus razor sharp resonance.

I WILL say this: The people at Galleria Domain II in Chicago rocked my world.

Seriously.

People shared some deep ass shit in there, and it is an honor to have the feedback when you are presenting. That dynamic is effulgent.

I’m not sure if it is OK to name the organizers names but I will do so once I haz brainz back and I know it is OK, because they re doing an amazing job there.

If you were in the room Saturday……thank you. You rocked.

If you were at the party late Saturday……your energy was amazing.

If you got into my head, made me laugh and made me cry and brought me to a speechless breathless place then held me as I slept through the night……you are a gift, a blessing, and I hope to soon be able to put words to the song you reminded me to sing to myself. You fucking rock! :-D

This Friday night was very challenging for me, in that I was teaching a class on Race Play for the local Women’s BDSM organization, the Exiles. It is the class that makes me the most edgy, and not just for the obvious reasons. It is tough enough to present at ALL for kinksters. But I knew that there would be some people there for whom this was a very difficult topic. I also knew that I was a little anxious about doing a demo. It is a tough line to walk between doing something meaningful and doing something over the top.

Then as I was getting settled in, I learned that someone had written an e-mail message in protest of the class and sent it to the Women’s Building, a community center and the location of my class.

How Can I help? I am writing to this group to stop the promotion of tolerance to racism.

It is like stepping in hot water and becoming tolerant to it, we step into the pool of

acceptance of racism , we become it, remember the kensington experiment.

Where students pretended to be guards and actually became the characters they

played and killed their fellow students. This is so wrong, promote healthy race

relations, instead of tolerance and sexualizing it.

Be The Change!!!!

I am writing in regards to the ridiculous notion that acting out one’s fantasy

of racism in sex has any merit or positive outcomes. It is just wrong, to

immerse oneself in the area of sexualizing and allowing racist scenes for

the benefit of one’s sexual or psyche’s needs is proposterous. It is damaging the

years and LIVES given for ending racism. It is encouraging it to continue and grow.

Remember the Kensington experiment in which students portrayed guards and inmates and the

students actually assumed the character’s valance and

even killed their student counterparts in this powerful experiment.

It shows us that assuming a character or a behavior is very

powerful. that is has powerful consequences, and horrific outcomes.

I implore us to stop this group of people who promote racism and

violence towards women as a good thing, as a pretend, healing, normal

way of releasing one’s fears and hidden monsters. This actually

releases and normalizes the monsters into our daily thoughts. BE THE

CHANGE, do not feed the problem. If you feed your racist, violent

thoughts, they grow!!!!If you have the fears around your inner

racism, help someone of a different race and learn that there is no

difference that cannot be accepted through compassion.

Great.

I must say….if I have to be anywhere where there is a possible threat of Shit Going Down, a gym full of righteous babes, furious femmes, bad-ass butches and Riot Grrls isn’t a bad locale from which to defend oneself.

The funny thing is, if she’d come to the class, she’d have heard me address all of those points. But that matters little, because she wants to deny me the right to be a fucking freak.

But, I took many deep breaths, had a bottle of water, and plunged in.

Now, I gotta toot my horn here for a second, because I’m not good at it and need to practice :-)

I am not great at taking credit where I’ve dona a good job. I am often pretty crap about even feeling good when other people tell me I’ve done well.

But it is quite rare to receive a standing ovation from a great many of the people in the room when you wrap up a class. It is also insanely crazy to have people who are my mentors in the Leather Community, women who have paved the road on which I now walk come up to me and say things that blow my mind. It was so fucking powerful I still don’t know how to talk about it.

I feel honored. I feel as though the difficulty I have had around issues of race and play, all the people who talked huge amounts of shit, all of the tears I shed feeling like yes, there must be something terribly wrong with me to have these desires….that all of that was completely worth it when person after person came up to me and thanked me and told me that they thought what I was doing was important, that they really heard and were pleased to listen…

I kinda kicked ass, y’all.

Shit! I mean, to have so many people give so much love what overwhelming.

I felt very honored, very special, very humbled, very proud.

To all of the women who were there: THANK YOU. Thank you to my friends, co-workers, mentors, heroines, everyone. You are amazing amazing women.

After the class I spent almost another hour talking to people, coming down.

Then, as we were finally kicked out of the building around 11:00.

Of course, the class wasn’t entirely over, was it? In front of the venue, an odd moment of Zen.

A very very intoxicated person came up and clutched my arm. A transwoman of color, I wasn’t sure if she’d been in the class or not but almost immediately assumed NOT, as someone that massively fucked up would have stood out like a sore thumb.

Since I taught a class on Tact and Diplomacy and yadda yadda and talked about shit like “gracious communication” and using “I feel” and “I think” statements, I sure as hell better practice what I preach.

Or at least give it my best fucking shot.

I was proud that, despite the occasional disappointment, fleeting moment of excruciating discomfort, and shrieking cliffs of self-doubt, I did manage to get through a 3 day event without a total nervous breakdown.

Win!

LOTS of that was due to the kick ass Twitterfolk with whom I met up at the event. I’d met a few of them last month in NY, and hooked up with even more Tweeterz at Dark Odyssey. I can’t say enough abut the benefit of having online friends with whom you can meet-up at these events.

The smoothness of the weekend is also due to the stellar job of organizing executed by the Dark Odyssey team.

I have been to a few perv conventions. And for an event of this scope to have had no major issues, for the attitude to be smooth and relaxed, for there to be so many presenters and so many guests, and for the small fires that did come up to have been resolved with such grace is stunning.

To the faces of Dark Odyssey, Tristan, Colten, Karri and Greg, I say

Holy fucking shit y’all kicked ALL kinds of ass!!

And a thanks to the dozens of volunteers who gave of themselves and their time. You rocked the mike.

The promotional mixer I hosted on Saturday night went well too, and for that I am grateful.

I was especially delighted to see a crowd that was far more diverse than most BDSM events I attend. At one point, while in a cluster of folks chatting I noted that we’d reached historically illegal levels of Negrosity…so I immediately busted out and played my RACE cards. I was sure to share them with all the People of Color present. They came in handy later as well, with a kinkster of Jewish extraction. So watch out, people! Fuck around and you might find that friendly neighborhood minority playing a RACE card on ya. BOOYACHAKA!

Traveling solo and being single, I had little thought that I might have the opportunity to play or participate in a scene over the weekend.

But I’m foolishly optimistic, and so I had some hope that I might happen upon just the right situation and wind up playing.

On the first night I did receive a solicitation…from a slightly tipsy submissive man.

Not quite my speed, but he was very nice and totally a hoot! I’ll even forgive him for expressing his “disappointment” about the fact I wasn’t a dominant.

I get that so often I can’t even bother to be unsettled by the potential / implied lack of respect for my me-ness in that kind of attitude.

And frankly, there is no way he could know that is a nagging sticking place of mine and that I will, now and again, late at night squeeze my eyes shut real right and thump my heels together three times whispering “There’ s No Space Like Domme… There’ s No Space Like Domme…There’ s No Space Like Domme…” wondering if maybe, just maybe, if I wish hard enough…I’ll wake up in the morning with a thirst to have obedience poured across my lips like so much honeyed mead on the tongue of a Egyptian queen with a flinty gaze sparking from her kohl-rimmed smoky topaz-eyes… like so many rivulets of blood rushing over the burning feet of Kali as she devours her victims, willing or un…

But alas, I always seem to wake up and am, once again, a solo submissive, slaving away, schlepping kitteh poop, working all day to being home the Science Diet Senior to two four legged furry feline switches.

But Sunday morning…ah. Delight.

Please note: the time stamp is in PST and I was livin' in EST. No bloody fucking way was I up that fucking early on a Sunday. *pfft*

I was a little excited.

Long day and long story short, it was much later in the evening when, showered, stretched out, warmed up and ready to go I flitted downstairs to the main Dungeon space to track down and get busy with the play-partner with whom I was very excited to scene.

Alas, even from across the Dungeon I immediately sensed that tonight was not gonna be the night.

It wasn’t surprising that he was tired: it had been a long day. And of course I was am glad to have been asked, and there will, hopefully soon, be another opportunity for us to play in the future.

So “Mature Mollena” was smiling, being all calm and Zen, and understanding that hey, shit happens, and at least I had an afternoon of sweet anticipation. That is cool!

However “Inner Child Mo” wasn’t at all serene and was jiving more like this now infamous chick…

I was bummed out. Feeling disinclined to watch other people having the kind of fun I wanted to have, I was about to swiftly depart the Dungeon to hide in my room once more.

Just as I was grinding my teeth together in the middle of that external vs. internal split, I noted a gal who’d been in one of my classes standing several feet away, expectantly, but respectful of the several conversations in which I was engaged. I started chatting with her and wow was I glad I did.

It was stunning how, just as I was about to be a piteous poutygurl, I received the most precious gift of all: one person telling me that she was moved and changed by what I had to say in my class.

I had a catch in my throat because, I mean, holy shit. Seriously?

How beautiful that on the heels of nipping nipping nipping at at the blue-grey Eeyore-esque ass of self-pity was this bright-eyed lovely girl who shared with me the best feedback of all: I made a difference.

See, as a kink educator, I have the unique opportunity to share my experience with other perverts. I think that is a singular honor, one I don’t take lightly, and one I am always amazed is extended to me.

But, like anything else, it has its pitfalls. No matter how many times I may think “This isn’t a competition, I’m there because I have something positive to share, and I’ll do my best and it will be great!” I can’t avoid that second-guessing voice that nags away. “Oh hey, you’re just standing around…talking. Huh. That’s…nice. But see, THAT class has naked girls being beaten…THAT one has 62 people simultaneously having Tantric orgasms….THAT one has loud and sexy whip cracking…”

If you have ever been to a kink event, you know what a sensory overload it can be. No matter your experience level, it is a great deal to take in. If you HAVEN’T been to a leather event, imagine a Trade Show / Street Fair / Lecture Series / Circus …with Leather and Sex and Fuck and Perversion dripping oozing cavorting burning and screaming all around you for. Three. Days. Straight.

Don’t get me wrong. Please. This is NOT A BAD THING. It is indeed an excellent thing.

I’ll be fine. These are my tribe, after all. I agonized for a long time before I decided to cross into real-time with BDSM. I agonized again when i decided to go totally public as someone involved in the Leather community. o this day,I struggle with being a woman, submissive, and Black. The shit ain’t easy. But if I don’t find a switchback strength in it, I’d leave hold of the path and settle into familiar tracks.

The risk, the strangeness, the thrill and yes, the discomfort and uncertainty, all of those things make it worth it.

Even if, sometimes, you get drowned out by a vigorous fist-fucking in the next room.

So I belatedly wish to give a shout out to those awesome ass-kicking Kinksters living amidst the south-west sandstorms, sunsets, snakes and succulents.

APEX? Word, yo.

Firstly to Red for her invitation and ease of negotiation. Red, ya kick ass. Keep on keeping on. Secondly to my magnanimous, magnificent hostess, Slave Tina. Spending time with her was finding old Soul Family. It is a humbling leap of faith to have a stranger in your home, and to provide care and support for them. She not only made me feel welcome, but gave me space when I just needed to curl up and nudged me when I needed to get up an out and let my hair down. Tina, you were beyond a home-stay, you made it feel like a homecoming. My most effusive words cannot fully express how much I was humbled and honored to be your guest.

APEX has a wonderful dungeon space, with welcoming energy, and I simply cannot say enough about how well I was treated, and with so much warmth and acceptance by the folks there.

I had a handful of attendees for the long-form class I taught, end even though I tend to be paradoxically horribly stage-affrighted when talking about kink in such an intimate group, I was as comfortable as if I was with friends of many years.

Thanks to Board Members Oden, for his warm welcome and for getting me in trouble by making me late for my own class, and Lady Joy, for her support and smile.

Thanks to the Church’s Chicken Lunch Crew, because damn. Sometimes a sister just needs some fucking fried chicken, yo!

Those calls of gratitude are, of course, also for the staffers and volunteers who put themselves out there. There were many of y’all who I met and who made me smile or think in ways for which I am eternally grateful. Don’t want to violate attendee confidentiality but you know who you are. Out yourselves here if you like!

You have a really solid strong and vibrant community in the arid, beautiful desert lands, APEX.